HOW TO RUN HALLOWEEN IN YOUR BUSINESS

Halloween as a good seasonal opportunity: 

1. Leverage it as much an adult season as one for kids.
2. Halloween parties are strong in popularity, expanding what you can sell. 
3. Product categories that can work for you: plush (Jazwares) costumes (Rubies), party items (Lombards) Pops (Ikon), crazy fun gifts (IS and more) anything slime.
4. Halloween gives you something to come out of Father’s Day with. As soon as Father’s Day is done, put up Halloween.
5. It is an excellent lead up to Christmas.
6. It’s fun – with fun displays and a dress up opportunities for staff.
7. It promotes retail theatre – show off your point of difference.
8. Halloween products are purchased on impulse – giving you a deeper basket.
9. A good Halloween display in the window attracts new traffic to your business.
10. It is not expensive to embrace. You can be in the season for under $500.00.
11. It works anywhere: city, country, high street, mall, tourist location and transit.

Decide what Halloween is about in your business. Our advice: beyond the usual selling of spider webs, make up, fake blood and related products. Centrepieces priced at $100 to $500 can work. Horror movie themed pops and related pop culture products can work. 

It is easy to compete at the everyday Halloween end with supermarkets. Marking up lower end product by 100% will still you lower than the supermarket.

We recommend setting up immediately after Father's Day as people will buy early.

In our years of experience with Halloween, no newsXpress location is too small or too large to have a successful Halloween season. What you achieve is up to you: how you embrace the opportunity – and how you promote it. We are here to help.

History of Halloween

Halloween is a holiday celebrated on the night of October 31.  The word Halloween is a shortening of All Hallows' Evening also known as Hallowe'en or All Hallows' Eve.  It’s not a satanic or pagan celebration. No, the roots go back to a liturgical tradition with Celtic roots.

Our suggestions

1. Make sure you you have an every day offer with brooms, pitch-forks, masks (the Scream mask is usually popular), spider webs, gloves and make up.
2. Buy big items to be a centrepiece – a hanging skeleton, a large mirror with sound. Often you will sell these props to people having Halloween parties at home.
3. Consider selling trick or treat candy packs so people have something ready.
4. Consider themes: zombies, witches, horror etc. Specialising is a point of difference.
5. Price at 100% mark-up – more if competition nearby is low or your range is different.

Visual merchandising tips

1. Go big and bold. This is the only option with Halloween. But have fun!!
2. Use your newsXpress exclusive posters for embracing the season.
3. Use newsXpress dump bins for everyday items at the front of the display. 

Halloween Marketing tips

Here is a list of ideas from which you can select for promoting Halloween in your business:

1. Get all staff members on board. Explain the season and its importance to the business as a segue to Christmas.
2. Fun is the focus.
3. Make sure you have a broad range of products, beyond the traditional for Halloween.
4. Create en environment. Get people stepping through scary.
5. Encourage trick or treaters in your show or with other shops nearby. Setup a time. Offer candy. Offer engagement.
6. Setup a Facebook post and invite customers to share their best Halloween photos.
7. Setup a Halloween inspiration wall inviting customers to post their photos of Halloween as inspiration for others. This is important as it encourages people to get into Halloween and growing this community is good for business.
8. Get all your horror themed pops together and create a series of Facebook posts to promote these over time. There are many from which to choose. 
9. Host an event, a party or some other event. Or, if you are old, host multiple events - one  that is kid themed and one for adults, maybe at night time. Maybe, even, a late at night storytelling event where locals tell scary stories - this is about offering entertainment without the usual commercial focus.
10. Have a fancy dress competition on the day.
11. Run a colouring competition for kids with a prize for the best and a charity donation to encourage engagement.
12. Print a recipe sheet and give this away. You can rind plenty of ideas online. Maybe, hand out a new recipe each week.
13. Give away a Halloween cookbook.
14. Maybe even involve a retirement village and sponsor a ghost storytelling night in a local park.

 The most important Halloween advice: HAVE FUN!